Composers See Tsunami of Copyright Infringement Suits

Their major concern recently is the flood of copyright lawsuits infringement lawsuits with hefty verdicts. Joining me is Vernon Silver, Bloomberg new senior reporter for Projects and Investigations. So Vernon tell us a little bit about this breakfast club. Yeah, this is interesting. You know, went to one of their their meetings early one Monday morning recently in Malibu to

take their pulse about these these infringement lawsuits. And we've we've heard a lot from some of the old rockers from the classic rock and classic soul era about their protests about how their work is being lifted. And I wanted to see what current composers were saying about this,

and the fact is they're scared. Um. You know, they make their living day in day out through ads and soundtracks to TV and and uh and movies, making new music that that's catchy, and they really do have to stand on the shoulders of of giants, and these legal challenges, uh, you know are tough for them. Uh. What I found fascinating is you right that they sort of re enact some of the famous trials that have gone wrong apparently recently for them, which is the Blurred Lines trial and

the recent Katie Perry trial exactly. And what they've done is they've come to the opposite conclusion of what you know, people off the street on a jury come to you know, they say, you know, someone, here's the two records together on a jury and they say, yeah, it sounds the same guilty in their case. As as professionals. They they this sort of infringement as well, they didn't copy the

exact notes and that kind of thing. And what's happening now is they have their eyes on the big one coming up, which is the steroid to Heaven dispute, which is hitting next week in the in San Francisco, and the appeals court. It seems like everyone. In fact, the court in New York put on hold the trial over ed Sharon's song because they're waiting for this Ninth Circuit appellate argument, which is going to be an on bank court. That means eleven judges on the court. What's going to

happen there? Yeah, I mean, this is this is what it's really building up to. All of these cases which have involved on some case of Marvin Gay and Katie Perry and you know, all these big names, the oldies versus the new the new ones really come to a head next week at this at this hearing in San Francisco where this is the test case. You know, one step from the Supreme Court over how how to understand what copying of these old songs are. In this case,

it's steroid to heaven. Everybody knows the sending notes of that were they lifted from this obscure instrumental called Tourists by the band's spirit. There's the nineteen sixties song um that very few people have heard, but that you know, Jimmy Page from led Zeppelin had this record in his collection. Maybe he copied it, maybe he didn't. Um. The The thing here is how they made copyright protection until was by depositing a little piece of sheet music in the

copyright office in Washington. In this case, it was just a hundred and twenty four notes that were written down and stuck in the in the copyright office in this case. And you know, should that be enough for should they listen to the record when comparing them. That's that's what's that stake care And you talk in your article about thin protection, that it could lead to thin protection, explain

what you mean by that. Yeah, this has turned into a showdown between you know, the entire music industry, which is backed by the Trump administration in this case, and you know it really it's led Zeppelin's case, but it's turned into the whole music industries case now versus the

old composers from the oldies. And what they're arguing is that some of these these old songs should really be given thin copyright protection, meaning that if they were just built out of commonplace musical themes and piece together in some way that seems original but maybe is not so original, that maybe we should just give thin protection to the

older songs. The upshot being that if led Zeppelin in the music industry get their way in this case, that a lot of these older songs will really be open for you know, free picking by members of this breakfast club in Malibu, for example, who will then be able to use kind of whatever they want. And it could be not just even music, like what happens if you have thin protection for screenplays. Maybe I don't lift the entire screenplay of your TV show, but maybe I take

the idea a little bit. And that's what they're worried about. No, I wonder led Zeppelin one at the trial level, so the jury voted for led Zeppelin, and a lot of that may have been, you know, a feel for led Zeppelin, this iconic band. Now you have the trump in the illustration, the music industry on led Zeppelin's side, and one wonders how that might play into things. It makes it makes me wonder, Yeah, I mean, these are these are rock stars.

I mean I was at the trial, you know, in Los Angeles, and there was one moment I counted the minutes, twenty two minutes in which all three surviving members of led Zeppelin were there in the courtroom with the only about fifty of us. There is a star quality to this, you know, And and if you think of also the age, a lot of these federal judges, these are people of a generation who might have liked led Zeppelin. Um, they

could be seen as sympathetic. But that's what the other side wants to argue in this is you know, how how about these these less paid, lesser known songwriters from that era, whether in Seoul or rock, Um, don't they deserve to have their intellectual property protected? To well, I was just at the Rock and Roll exhibit at the MET here and they have you know, pages all his his guitars, and they have a video of him and

I had to tell you that it was entrancing. So is he going to be or are any members of the band going to be at the at the hearing next week? And none of none of them are expected to show up. We checked the touring schedules. You know, Robert Plant is vaguely in the area. Um, but I think they were loads to show up for the for the trial itself, So I don't think any any star

watchers are going to catch them there. Your best bet actually is going to the met exhibit and listen to the video the Jimmy Page made where he really talks about the creation of Stairway to Heaven. I mean, I'm

surprised it's not an exhibit in the trial at this point. Well, now, just just to take us back for a second, just review briefly the history of this, of the of the led Zeppelin trial where it's been um it's it's started with a Bloomberg Business Week story that compared the two uh and we went and interviewed some of the band members from and family members from Spirit and UM and

their lawyer. And in the process of that and two thousand and fourteen, UH they student Philadelphia got transferred to uh L A and and really this is about the early you know, they rehashed the history where led Zeppelin's first concert in the US with them opening for Spirit UM and you know, and in the following days they started playing a Spirit song and they piece this together. You know, would led Zeppelin have heard the song that

they they owned the record and all this stuff. And it's an interesting tale that you know, it's ancient rock history, but you know it's intriguing. It's the story. It's the story of our culture. It absolutely is. And I'll bring Jason Kelly in here because it is it's so fascinating when you hear this and it doesn't happen anymore in rock Well and and Vernon, you've been tracking this so closely. We love talking to you about it for our Business

Week radio and television shows. This could fundamentally change the way that musicians think about how they put together songs, right, No, Jason, You're right. I mean this is and talking to them if you think about it, just in the soundtracks for films, the way you know, a director makes the film and just shoves in a couple of songs called spec songs and say, you know, for this scene, makes something that sounds like that. And this is how the music is made.

It's reverse engineered. How much can we do to make it sound a certain way? You know, if you open up some of these these riffs and guitar solos, sax solos that were never written down on the sheet music there's deposited in Washington. You open that up, they can they can make ring tones, you can. You have to leave it there, Vernon, but we will check back with you after the trial, which is next week. After the hearing, I should say that's Vernon Silver, Bloomberg News Senior reporter

for Projects and investigations. Thanks for listening to the Bloomberg Law Podcast. You can subscribe and listen to the show on Apple podcast, SoundCloud, and on Bloomberg dot com slash podcast. I'm June Brosso. This is Bloomberg Ye